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Layoffs Looming at Planned Parenthood

Planned Parenthood has filed an emergency appeal to stop the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) from issuing grants to family planning providers under new rules that exclude abortion providers, a move they say will force them to lay off staff en masse and shutter clinics.

According to Live Action News, Planned Parenthood is beginning to panic after failing to stop the HHS from awarding Title X grants for family planning services under new provisions that will disqualify clinics that provide abortion services or referrals to receive money. With the monetary awards scheduled to begin on August 15, the abortion giant is already feeling the pinch from the $60 million it stands to lose when these funds dry up.

Planned Parenthood’s troubles started earlier this month when U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden denied their challenge to the new rules, calling it “premature since the awards have not yet been granted.”

However, waiting until after the granting of awards is not an option for Planned Parenthood, their attorneys said. The organization, along with the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association immediately sought an emergency injunction from the D.C. Circuit claiming irreparable harm to millions of Title X patients who will be denied healthcare if they are cut off from these funds.

“Those are not harms that can simply be reversed if we were to prevail at the end of the case,” said attorney Paul Wolfson, who argued on behalf of the abortion providers, according to Courthouse News.

Judge McFadden was skeptical, saying that Planned Parenthood and the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association represented roughly 84 percent of Title X grants and that many of these facilities – those that don’t perform abortion or provide abortion referrals – will still receive money under the revised criteria. In other words, the harm is not exactly irreparable.

Department of Justice attorney Alicia Hunt agreed, arguing that that any perceived harm to Planned Parenthood and the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association “is ‘speculative’ at this point, since they remain eligible to be awarded Title X grants.”

McFadden even went so far as to suggest that the providers begin to incorporate abstinence education into their Title X programs and told Wolfson he believed his clients were already well situation to get Title X grants for the coming year.

McFadden is expected to rule on the emergency appeal on Wednesday, August 1, at 3:00 p.m.

Let us pray that in this hour of mercy, Judge McFadden will thwart this latest attempt by Planned Parenthood and its allies to continue receiving taxpayer funds that can be used to kill innocent unborn Americans.